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All Basketball, All The Time

5,213 articles

On The Court

Off The Court

The first basketball card? Murad Cigarettes 1909 card for Williams College.

What do Barack Obama, Amos Alonzo Stagg and John Edgar Wideman have in common? They are all basketball players better known for other things.

Origins of the Game

This 12th Street YMCA team from Washington, DC was declared Colored Basketball World's Champions in 1910.

The NBA traces its roots back to 1946 and the Basketball Association of America. But the first documented professional basketball game in the US took place in 1896, just five years after James Naismith wrote the rules. The first pro league -- the National Basket Ball League -- began operations in 1898.

It was a wild time, with barnstorming teams, leagues that came and went, and men who could play for three teams in three leagues at the same time. Read about the beginnings of pro ball in NBA Roots.

Smith College Class of 1895 team

Basketball spread across the country like wildfire in the 1890s. Lots of people were looking for a competitive indoor game in the winter. But it wasn't just the guys. As soon as boys started playing, girls did, too. Check out some of the articles about the women's game.

Who was the first men's college national champ? Temple, winner of the 1938 National Invitation Tournament (NIT)? The Oregon Ducks, winners of the 1939 NCAA championship? The Helms Foundation picked mythical national champions for every season between 1901 and 1983. That expert panel picked Yale, 1901, as the first national champ. See if you agree with the Helms Foundation picks.

Nat Holman in his Original Celtics uniform, 1922.

All articles about African-Americans and basketball

"Why are they so good at basketball? They dominate the sport. They must have some innate physical advantage that the rest of us don't have." Sound familiar? But in the first half of the 20th Century "they" were Jews. Many of the top players were kids who grew up playing ball on the tough streets of New York and Philadelphia. Kids like Nat Holman (right), Barney Sedran, Bennie Borgmann, Max Friedman and Eddie Gottlieb, who all grew up to be Hall of Famers. To learn more about race and hoops, read Questions of Race.

In 1897 the Amateur Athletic Union organized a tournament to determine a national men's basketball champion. They've been holding such tournaments ever since. For most of the first half of the 20th Century the AAU was the most prestigious championship there was. For a listing of all the championship games, go to AAU Men's Champions.

The Nankai Five Tigers: China's first dominating team, ca. 1896.

Basketball is a world game. It is huge in China, and has been since the early 20th Century (left). Read about the beginnings of basketball in China. You might be surprised to learn that Professional Basketball in China started only in 1995.

This Day In Basketball History
1898 - Trenton (above) rallies in the second half to defeat the Hancock Athletic Association team, 21-19, in the debut game of the National Basket Ball League, the first professional league. 1956 - The United States defeats the Soviet Union, 89-55, in the gold medal game of the Melbourne Olympics. Bill Russell leads the Americans in the games with a 14.1 ppg average. 1961 - Hall of Famer Paul Arizin (right) of the Philadelphia Warriors scores 33 points against the Los Angeles Lakers to become the third NBA player to score 15,000 points in his career after Bob Cousy and Dolph Schayes. 1981 - Kareem Abdul-Jabbar surpasses Oscar Robertson (26,710) to become the NBA's second all-time leading scorer behind Wilt Chamberlain (31,419). 1985 - Duke beats Kansas, 92-86, to capture the first-ever NIT Season Tip-Off championship. At the time it was called the "Big Apple NIT." 1991 - Isiah Thomas became the Detroit Pistons' all-time leading scorer, with 15,493 points, after scoring a game-high 22 points in a 94-87 win over Houston at the Palace of Auburn Hills. Thomas passed previous leader Bob Lanier on Detroit’s all-time scoring chart. 1997 - Angered by what he calls ongoing verbal abuse, Golden State Warriors guard Latrell Sprewell hits, then chokes his coach, P. J. Carlesimo, during a team practice. While later admitting that he made a mistake, Sprewell never apologizes to Carlesimo.
Recent Additions
See all recent articles and edits. Hall of Fame coach Pete Newell has passed away at 93. His teams won NIT, NCAA and Olympic championships. Newell was also well known for running "Pete Newell's Big Man Camp," which almost every great center in the NBA has attended. Remember Bill Sharman? A star baseball and basketball player at USC, an NBA All-Star eight times and coach of NBA and ABA championship teams, it's no wonder he was elected to the Basketball Hall of Fame twice. What do Aleksandar Nikolic, Mirko Novosel, Arad McCutchan and Ralph Miller have in common? They are all coaches enshrined in the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame. Check out their interesting and diverse life stories. Obama in High School Right: Before he was a President-Elect, before he was a Senator, he as a baller. Still is. Barack Obama, the lanky lefty from the Land of Lincoln, played and still plays. Will he put a court in the White House? Read about Barack Obama. Don't forget that she may be back to her day job as governor of Alaska now, but Sarah Palin was the point guard on her state championship team not too long ago. Find out how she got the name "Sarah Barracuda" here. Hall of Fame player Joseph Brennan was one of the top players in the American Basketball League in the 1920s and 1930s. Read his bio here. Right: Chuck Connors is better known as a Hollywood actor and even as a pro baseball player. But Celtics fans should remember him as the guy who broke the (wooden) backboard with a monster set shot, causing a long delay to the first Celtics game in 1946.
Basketball 101
Hack-a-Shaq demonstrated. Basketball: The Basics Original Rules Right: Did you know that Coach Don Nelson came up with the Hack-a-Shaq strategy with Dennis Rodman in mind, not Shaq? Read more about Hack-a-Shaq here. NBA Rules NCAA Rules Common Basketball Terms Slang Basketball Terms Fantasy Basketball: The Basics All Articles
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